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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23088157">Sins Freely Offered</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jake_the_space_cat/pseuds/Jake_the_space_cat'>Jake_the_space_cat</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Final Fantasy XIV</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Apologies, Feeding, Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers, Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers Spoilers, Friendship, Gen, Named Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Sin Eater Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Sin Eaters (Final Fantasy XIV), Transformation</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 11:48:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,513</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23088157</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jake_the_space_cat/pseuds/Jake_the_space_cat</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>If Emet-Selch is right and the Warrior of Light is a Lightwarden in all but form after Mt. Gulg, doesn't that mean he now needs living aether to survive?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>53</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Sins Freely Offered</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written right before starting the level 80 MSQ quests in Shadowbringers and set in the Tempest during that point in the story, so no idea how this matches up with where canon goes from there!</p><p>My WoL's Camille Delane, a Hyur Highlander and infant Ala Mhigan refugee from Theodoric's rule; his parents died fleeing the country and he was adopted and raised by an infertile Limsa Lominsan couple with a large extended family. Camille's mute due to a war injury from the Calamity and speaks in sign.</p><p>You can see art and learn more about Camille over at my <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kFn4Wd5Kon0Xpslt8Q6Lzv_kvpGQ8N_xH6-tTY7Dusw">extensive headcanon/loredump document</a>.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Ryne, help him!” Thancred's voice, harsh, somewhere to Camille's left.</p><p>“I can't!” Camille could feel Ryne's hands on his chest, could even feel her aether pushing at his, trying to force the Light back into the confines of his own increasingly worn soul. He tried to force the swaying lightheaded weakness that had brought him to his knees and then to the ground away, but it was too strong. He couldn't think around it, couldn't feel anything beyond a hollow fatigue and confusion. This wasn't the same as on Mt. Gulg, where the Light had sliced out from inside of him, cold implacable alien fire. This was something duller and softer. Some limit he'd reached and couldn't push past because he didn't have anything left to push <em>with.</em>“He's stopped trying to hold it back!”</p><p>“What? Camille!” Y'shtola's voice, sharp and commanding. “You are <em>not</em> giving up now.” Her hand joined Ryne's. “He's been hiding something. I've seen his aether weakening as the days pass.”</p><p>“Would that we had forced him to rest.” Urianger, close by, his voice even but heavy with self-recrimination. “As though any of us had the strength to keep him from a path once chosen.”</p><p>Camille tried to focus, but all he could see was the white haze of the Light. They needed to get away from him! If Ryne couldn't help him, then they needed to get away as quickly as they could, because there was no one else on the First who knew enough or had the power to--</p><p>Wait.</p><p>He tried to concentrate. He formed the sign in his mind, felt it waver, formed it again. He had to trust his fingers had formed it, too; everything was too soft around the edges for him to be certain.</p><p>“What are you doing to my darling sapling!”</p><p>The brusque heavily-accented voice cut through the muffled quiet of the Tempest's still air.</p><p>“Feo Ul!” Alphinaud's voice. “Your majesty, we--he collapsed. How did you--”</p><p>“He called me. My precious mortal is <em>finally</em> learning not to forget his loyal branch.”</p><p>He heard the soft buzz of pixie wings, close to his face. They hovered near for long seconds. “My precious mortal is also <em>starving.</em><em>”</em></p><p>Complete, abrupt silence. Even as blurry as his hold on consciousness was, Camille could feel the bafflement in the air.</p><p>“He's been eating with us.” Alisaie's voice, close by his side, opposite where he last heard Ryne's. “He's joined us for every meal since we left the Crystarium. We've--” she wavered “--we've all been watching him. To make sure he's—he's well.” To make sure he didn't withdraw and conceal changes, she meant. There'd been little chance for that; they'd all kept a close enough eye on him, he'd barely had any time to himself.</p><p>“He's been eating with you because you're his friends! Eating is a good game, and he's been playing at it with you because he knows you want him to play. Because my fragile mortal is an idiot who doesn't understand that you don't have to play a game that doesn't make <em>you</em> feel better any more just because <em>other</em> people still want to play.”</p><p>“King of the Faeries.” Urianger again. “As mortals, we eat out of genuine need, not out of play. Camille may have changed, but he is not as one of the Fair--”</p><p>“No, he is not! He's not like a pixie at all. But he does eat what we eat! Even if he doesn't know how to eat it.”</p><p>Another pause, broken this time by Y'shtola. “You're saying he's starving, but not for physical food. His body and soul are starving for aether.”</p><p>“Yes! Yes, yes, yes. And he's not one of the fae, so he can't eat it like we do, just by dancing through it. He can't breathe it in on the air. He has to eat it with flesh and blood. He has to take a life between his teeth and tear the aether from it like a wolf.” Feo Ul's voice was incredibly close now. “And my mortal doesn't have the teeth for tearing. Or the heart.” Their voice was soft and intimate, full of concern. He felt them touch his cheek, briefly.</p><p>Quiet again. An uncomfortable quiet, full of his friends imagining a monster devouring living prey. Camille tried to shift, to do something to break that quiet. He wasn't certain he'd succeeded, but Urianger did speak again.</p><p>“Feo Ul. If—our friend cannot hunt live flesh, can he yet take sustenance from aether freely given?”</p><p>“And how should I know! No one's given him any aether yet, have they? Because all of you have been too busy to even notice he's been going hungry for days!”</p><p>The others shifted around him. He heard Urianger again, closer now, say Y'shtola's name in an undertone. Y'shtola's hand lifted from his chest, and Ryne's followed a few seconds later, to be replaced by the Elezen's long, slender fingers.</p><p>“Be careful, Urianger.” Y'shtola's voice, heavy and weighted.</p><p>“I will give no more than I can spare.” Urianger coughed, an awkward, incongruously normal, nervous sound. “My friend. If you can hear me and the King of Faeries speaks the truth, please accept what I can give.” A pause before Urianger continued. “I know that thou mayest well yet resent the secrets I have kept. And thou hast the right. I kept them always in faith that the good would be greater than the harm, and yet...” A long sigh. “I promise, my friend. I will no longer assume that only in sorrow and sacrifice and secrecy can both thyself and the First be saved. My aether is yours. I give it freely and openly and only with your acceptance.”</p><p>Cam felt aether well into Urianger's palm and pool there, cupped warm against his own distant, cold skin. His consciousness focused, sharp and relieved, like someone finally making out the shape of a familiar landmark through deep fog. He reached out with his own aether, Lightwarden and Hyur both, and wrapped it around Urianger's hand, pulling in the threads of the Elezen's aether. Urianger's life. What he took settled into his chest with solid, reassuring substance, and the more he took, the more the world around him regained definition, anchored by that weight.</p><p>He sighed and raised one hand to rest over Urianger's on his chest. “It's working!” Alphinaud, sounding overjoyed—and then abruptly contrite. “Urianger, are you well? He's not--” Alphinaud broke off.</p><p>“I am well. He takes no more than the sins that I would offer.”</p><p>Camille took a deep breath, coiling one more loop of aether tightly into and around the Light within him. He squeezed Urianger's hand against his chest, a gesture of thanks, and closed his eyes.</p><p>When he opened them again, the Light had receded to the edges of his vision. He could see the faces of the others above him, see the gray-green mass of the Tempest's water above them all. Washed out and pale, yes, but no longer completely obscured by white.</p><p><em>&lt;Hey.&gt;</em> He waved his free hand very slightly and tried to smile.</p><p>“Camille, are you alright? Do you need more--” Ryne broke in breathlessly beside him, before both the sight of her face and the sound of her voice were obscured by a blur of red and a blast of Faery accent.</p><p>“My darling sapling <em>does</em> need more, and if he says no to someone who has all of the aether in Il Mheg to offer, I will take him back to Lyhe Giah and <em>force</em> him to take my scepter and not listen to him at all ever again.” The pixie settled crosslegged and cross-armed on his chest, just above Urianger's hand.</p><p>“Force him to take their <em>what?</em><em>” </em>he heard Alisaie hiss in an undertone beside him.</p><p>“It seems thou hast no more need of me, with the King of Faery to see to your well-being.” Urianger smiled, and Camille could see exhaustion in the lines of the Elezen's face. Concern spiked in his chest. <em>&lt;You...alright?&gt; </em>he signed imprecisely.</p><p>“Shh!” Feo Ul shushed them both. “I've heard enough about this one--” they pointed up at Urianger “--from the other pixies to know the games <em>he</em> plays. And he should be very grateful, because I just gave him the chance to apologize to you for cheating and to promise to play fairly from now on, and I really didn't have to. I have all the aether you need. He didn't actually <em>have</em> to give you any of his at all.”</p><p>Camille met Urianger's eyes around the smug pixie, and they both smiled, tired and rueful. “The fae give gifts as they choose.” Urianger stood, and the other Scions stood, too, forming a small, concerned circle around Camille. “We will retire a short distance and leave him to your ministrations, your majesty. Take the greatest care.”</p><p>Feo Ul settled their small palms flat against Camille's chest and began humming to themself as aether welled up from their hands.</p><p><em>&lt;Thank you.&gt; </em>Camille signed to Urianger as he left.</p>
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